it must govern through consent and not coercion. >> despite those strong statements, the u.s. remained mostly neutral and as quickly as it began, the movement was snuffed out through a series of brutal government crackdowns. at least three dozen people were killed, thousands arrested. honestly, we probably don't know how many people were killed. leaders like former prime minister mousavi are still under house arrest years later. today, the democracy movement has essentially been sidelined. instead, ahmadinejad is facing a different kind of political opposition. it's coming from the one man who has more power than he does. it's iran's 73-year-old supreme leader, ayatollah ali kmcomaney. determined not to consolidate his hold on power, kmany is expected to do all he can this time, including blacklisting candidates and engineering the election himself in order to install a candidate that is loyal to him. joining me now from london is nbc's tehran bureau chief, ali arouzi. ali, thanks for doing this for us. so set the stage a little bit here. we have these two forces, but if the a